More than 4,600 people have been plucked
to safety from unseaworthy boats off the Libyan coast over the past
three days, the Italian coastguard said Sunday, as migrants took
advantage of calmer waters to attempt the perilous journey across the
Mediterranean.
On Saturday alone, the coastguard
operations centre in Rome coordinated nine rescues, pulling 1,123 people
to safety from two boats and seven inflatable dinghies.
According to the United Nations, the
number of migrants crossing the Mediterranean to Europe fell by more
than a third last month, due to bad weather and a Turkish crackdown on
traffickers in the Aegean on the route to Greece.
Over 4,600 migrants who attempted the
crossing between Thursday and Saturday were encouraged by the calmer
waters to set off for the nearest Italian coast.
Several Italian coastguard vessels,
along with the German naval support ship Berlin, part of Operation
Sophia, an military EU mission to stop migrant traffickers, took part in
the rescues.
In late November, the International
Organization for Migration estimated that nearly 860,000 migrants had
landed in Europe so far this year, with more than 3,500 dying while
crossing the Mediterranean in search of safety.
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